Terence Trent Darby. This CD I DO own. With me, you know there is always a story attached to a musical memory. I have wanted to write about this…so here it is.

When I was 19, I was living in NYC with my father. I was going to school at the New School for Social Research. I worked at The Gap in Grenwisch Village at 8th and Broadway. I also babysat for Janee. Janee was a very well to do African American pre-teen who lived in Brooklyn in a fabulous old Brwonstone with her mother. Her mother was getting her Masters at UMASS in Amherst, MA and was taking a class with my mother.

My mother told her that I had moved to NYC, and that is how I met them. She was a slightly eccentric woman. Very warm and generous. She would stay up all night while she let me sleep in her King Sized bed.
She was depressed. Her husband worked at the record label taht was working on Janet Jackson’s new album. He worked with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis in LA. He came out once a month and I met him only one time. Very good looking and suave man.

I picked up Janee at school on Friday afternoons and would bring her (and her friends) over to Girl Scouts in Brooklyn Heights. I loved that Girl Scout Troup. I had a lot of fun. Then Janee and I would meet her mother for dinner and shopping. She would always buy me something, even though I would protest, which was not too bad for a 19 yr. old shopaholic. heh

I would sleep over at their house and the next day Janee and I would take a couple of trains to the area up by Columbia University (way Upper West Side Manhattan).

I would take her to this very posh music school. She took voice, violin and piano. When I was waiting for Janee I would talk to a woman Janee’s mom had introduced me to. Her daughter also took lessons at the music school. This woman worked for a record label in A&R. She was really cool and we really got a long well. She was actually a close friend of Janee’s dad.

She worked for Colombia Records. At that time they were promoting a very heavy Luther, “Faith” by George Michael and Terrence Trent Darby’s first album.

She gave me the Faith cassette and I really liked it. I had not heard Gerorge Michaels’s solo stuff. She also gave me TTD’s cassette as I had already heard him and was madly in “love” with the man. *phew* He was beautiful, deep, lovely voice, creative, black, sexy, etc…

*fanning self*

So…one night she asked me to come by her office at Colombia to pick up two VIP tickets for Luther Vandross to the TTD concert at the ROXY. Yes…THE Roxy. She had already offered me two tix and I brought my new and short lived RICH GIRL friend. I dropped off the tix for Luther at his hotel and we went to the concert. The Roxy is a pretty cool place. Lots of famous faces up in the VIP section. We were about 30 ft. from the stage. When TTD came out on stage my knees buckled and I swooned over him as he sang. I sang all the words as I had almost worn out the cassette in a weeks time.

He was singing “Let’s go Forward” and he was looking for a focal point in the audience. And guess what…he focused in on me. For a good 20 seconds or more. I am not sure…I was captured by his light brown eyes.

Man…his braids..those lips. mmm I was still fairly “pure” at that point in my life, but I would have become a groupie in a hot second.

So…here are some of the lyrics TTD wrote. I still identify with them to this day. More than I wish to…

Here is another picture of this gorgeous..IMHO…man.

Let’s Go Forward

Let’s go forward with our love
I don’t ask for your money
I don’t ask for your honey
All I want is love
Let’s go forward with our love
I don’t ask for your wallet
Let’s finish what we started
All I need is love

And in your private moments
When all the world is sleep
I watch you as you toss and turn
And pray my soul you’ll keep
I sense you are afraid
That I’m not holding fast
But you are just nervous
And I’m certain that this too will pass

Let’s go forward with our love
I don’t ask for your money
I don’t ask for your honey
All I want is love

Our dedication wanders
You’re hurt from what you hear
But then the rain falls down
And wipes away your tears
The stars are everlasting
But even they shift from time to time
If we just slow down
Catch our breath
We’ll be fine

Let’s go forward with our love
I don’t ask for your wallet
Let’s finish what we started
All I need is love

Silver turns to black
And gold turns into green
Giving my love back
Would tear away our seed
Like real silver and gold
We can keep our vows
Your hand I will hold
Until the killing ground
Let’s go forward with our love

This song is so timely it is not even funny.

Sign Your Name

Fortunately you have got
Someone who relies on you
We started out as friends
But the thought of you just caves me in
The symptoms are so deep
It is so much too late to turn away
We started out as friends

Sign your name
Across my heart
I want you to be my baby
Sign your name
Across my heart
I want you to be my lady

Time I’m sure will bring
Disappointments in so many things
It seems to be the way
When your gambling cards on love you play
I’d rather be in Hell with you baby
Than in cool Heaven
It seems to be the way

Sign your name
Across my heart
I want you to be my baby
Sign your name
Across my heart
I want you to be my lady

Birds never look into the sun
Before the day is gone
But oh the light shines brighter
On a peaceful day
Stranger blue leave us alone
We don’t want to deal with you
We’ll shed our stains showering
In the room that makes the rain

All alone with you
Makes the butterflies in me arise
Slowly we make love
And the Earth rotates
To our dictates
Slowly we make love

Sign your name
Across my heart
I want you to be my baby
Sign your name
Across my heart
I want you to be my lady

2 Comments on A Caramel Skinned Man and a Blue Eyed Girl

I was listening to the radio the other day and they said they were going to play some TTD. I used to listen to him all the time and wanted to hear the song, but we reached our destination and I had to get out of the car.
I miss hearing his songs. I’ll have to add him to my music station on Yahoo. I absolutely loved that tape.

Born in the Year of the Monkey(1968): a multi-racial woman , single mother, non profit professional, computer tech and tutor, personal chef, spiritual and political being. I write about my daily life, things that move and also anger me and a random mix of other topics.